


A Thing Apart

by empressearwig



Category: Pink Carnation Series - Lauren Willig
Genre: Canon Relationships - Freeform, F/M, Five Times, Introspection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-16
Updated: 2012-12-16
Packaged: 2017-11-21 07:35:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,023
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/595152
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/empressearwig/pseuds/empressearwig
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Or, Five Conversations Between the Pink Carnation, nee Miss Jane Wooliston, and her Chaperone, Miss Gwendolyn Meadows, on the subject of Love.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Thing Apart

**Author's Note:**

  * For [nocowardsoul](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nocowardsoul/gifts).



> Happy Yuletide, nocowardsoul! I sincerely hope that you enjoy this, because once I got past the sheer terror of writing the character that we know the least about, I greatly enjoyed writing it.

> Gently, Augustus said, "Your loyalty does you credit."
> 
> "It's not loyalty, it's common sense." Jane cast him a look from beneath her bonnet, her gray eyes meeting his without fear or reservation. "Do you really believe I would allow personal affection to blind me to a danger?"
> 
> Augustus looked at Jane, her cool gray eyes at odds with the youthful smoothness of her skin, the pale pink flush of her cheeks.
> 
> Yes, he wanted to say. Yes, and it might not be a bad thing. There were times when it might be well to allow affection to supersede prudence, for emotion to trump logic. To entirely eschew human weakness was to become a thing apart. In short, Miss Gwen.
> 
> ~ _The Garden Intrigue by_ Lauren Willig, page 115

i.

"Fools," harrumphed Miss Gwen. She thumped her umbrella against the marble floor of the Hotel de Balcourt's entryway for emphasis, as if the scorn evident in the single word hadn't been clear enough that even the servants who didn't speak English could understand. 

Jane paused, her hand resting on the gilded hand rail and her foot poised on the first step to the east wing and their considerably more private rooms. "Lord Richard and Amy?" she asked. She was reasonably certain that she already knew the answer to her question.

"Of course," said Miss Gwen. She looked affronted that Jane had even needed to ask. "Do we know any others who were so foolish as to compromise their secret identities and were forced to flee for the safety of England?"

Jane nodded her head slightly, in acknowledgment of the hit. That she had let Miss Gwen have it, she found not worth mentioning. "What is it that Mister Shakespeare says on the subject? Oh yes, 'the course of true love never did run smooth,'" Jane said whimsically. She could only hope for her cousin's sake that his words would prove true. "Perhaps their admittedly--unconventional, shall we say--"

"Disastrous," interjected Miss Gwen.

"--beginnings, will guarantee that their road from here will run a steadier course." She inclined her head towards the stairs. "Shall we go up?"

Jane didn't wait for Miss Gwen to follow, but began climbing the stairs certain that her chaperone would be close at heel. 

At the top of the landing, Miss Gwen spoke again. "I believe Shakespeare had this to say, too. 'Lord, what fools these mortals be.' What do you think about _that_ , missy?"

Jane allowed her lips to curve up into the smallest of smiles. "Miss Gwen, I do believe you're right."

ii. 

"Just what is so fascinating about that letter?" snapped Miss Gwen. "I would not have thought Henrietta Selwick capable of producing anything so utterly enthralling."

Jane lifted her gaze from her letter, raising a solitary eyebrow at Miss Gwen. Miss Gwen met her gaze defiantly and Jane smiled ever so slightly. "Now, now," said Jane. "Henrietta is the very model of good sense." She paused for just half a beat before continuing. "Well, most of the time."

"Ha!" said Miss Gwen triumphantly. "What has the chit done? Has she followed in her brother's foolish footsteps and run off with someone?"

"No," said Jane. She tapped her fingers against the letter thoughtfully, deliberating on the choice of her next words. "Or perhaps, I should more accurately say not _yet_."

Miss Gwen stalked across the salon to snatch the letter from Jane's hands. Jane sat back in her chair, amusement flickering over her face as Miss Gwen scanned the contents of the letter. When she finished, Miss Gwen tossed it back down on the table.

"There's nothing there." Miss Gwen sounded disgusted and more than a little disappointed. "Has deciphering Whittlesby's poetry addled your brain?"

"I should hope not," Jane replied. She did her best to keep her amusement from leaking out onto her countenance. Judging by the scorn on Miss Gwen's face, it was not a wholly successful attempt.

"Then explain yourself," demanded Miss Gwen.

"It could be nothing," Jane began, "but the content--and I should say _tone_ , as well--of the letter was markedly different than Henrietta's previous missives."

Miss Gwen stared at her expectantly.

"There was rather more Miles," elaborated Jane.

"Dorrington?" Miss Gwen snorted derisively. "What was that you were saying about Henrietta Selwick having sense?"

Miss Gwen could have a point, Jane acknowledged to herself. Their previous encounter had left her with the impression of a rather overgrown puppy; endlessly loyal and devoted to those he loved, perhaps a trifle less intelligent than Jane herself would have preferred. But judging by the palpable affection that had existed between Henrietta and Miles, it was clear that any perceived shortcoming did not bother Henrietta even in the smallest amount.

Jane lifted her shoulders ever so slightly, in a conciliatory gesture. It wasn't an argument worth having. "Perhaps it's nothing," she said. "Now about the raid at the Ministry of Police..."

iii. 

"You're meddling," accused Miss Gwen, as she followed Jane into her dressing room. "Or worse: _matchmaking_."

Jane turned her head and found her chaperone framed in the doorway, a disgruntled scowl fixed firmly upon her face. She looked back to the mirror and lifted the wig from her head. "Can it really be matchmaking if the parties in question are already wed?"

"Harrumph," said Miss Gwen, which Jane took to mean that Miss Gwen did not care that Jane had an excellent point. "Meddling then. Do you deny that?"

"No," said Jane placidly. She allowed herself a small smile of victory. "I do not."

"Isn't foiling the French _and_ Irish enough of a challenge? Why are you adding Pinchingdale's marital woes to our list of difficulties?"

Jane raised an eyebrow at her in the mirror. " _Our_ , Auntie Ernie?"

" _Your_. And don't think I didn't notice that you didn't answer my question, young lady. Or what you had the temerity to call me."

Jane shrugged her shoulders, turning to face Miss Gwen dead on. It was really the only way to deal with her. It demonstrated that you did not show fear. "I think that matters will be easier to handle if Geoffrey is not distracted by--how did you put it?--his marital woes."

"And?" asked Miss Gwen expectantly. It was clear that she did not believe that the matter of Geoffrey's distractions was cause enough for Jane to entangle herself in his private concerns.

It would be a lie for Jane to say that she had not suffered from the same crisis of conscience. As a matter of principle--and safety, for that matter--it was best to stay out of the personal affairs of others whenever preventably possible. And yet, when matters such as these presented themselves, Jane was uncertain as to how not to entangle herself. She was already entangled by her very presence, after all, and it was obvious to anyone with two eyes what a suitable match this particular Alsworthy-Pinchingdale alliance could be if only all parties involved would open themselves to the possibility of it.

If one as wholly unromantic as Jane could see the marital potential, surely one as rational as Geoffrey could be induced to do the same.

"And I like Letty," Jane said, as a means of answering without betraying her rather more complicated feelings on the matter. "I think that she and Geoffrey are well-suited."

"Matchmaking," sneered Miss Gwen.

"If you like," acknowledged Jane.

Sometimes it was easier to simply let Miss Gwen win. Not that Jane would ever admit to such a thing.

"Harrumph," said Miss Gwen.

iv. 

"Is all in place for our return to France?" Miss Gwen demanded. She closed the door to Lord Uppington's study behind her and came further into the dimly lit room. "Will Vaughn be able to keep his mind on the mission long enough to complete it?"

Jane raised a single eyebrow at Miss Gwen, who made an impatient scoffing noise.

"What, am I blind?" Miss Gwen asked. "He has eyes for the Alsworthy chit; don't try to deny it."

"He has a wife," reminded Jane. "Although--"

"Yes?" 

Miss Gwen sounded positively triumphant, thought Jane. Well, she couldn't fault the other woman's powers of observation.

Jane shrugged her shoulders delicately. "I do believe Lord Vaughn's sentiments regarding marriage may have undergone a--" she paused, searching her vocabulary for precisely the right word "--a shift."

Miss Gwen snorted. "If he wants to marry the Alsworthy girl, I'd say he's setting himself up for the same kind of disaster that he faces with his current undead wife. There's no shift there."

"That he's thinking of marriage at all is," said Jane. She didn't know why the idea of it bothered her so; perhaps she'd believed them to be more than reluctant conspirators in the fight against the French, but also comrades in a war against a world that was determined to couple them all off two-by-two as if they were animals on Noah's ArK. She shook her head. She was being ridiculous. "At any rate, I do believe that Lord Vaughn will come through for us once more and that our return to France will not negatively affect the mission here in London."

"Good," said Miss Gwen.

"Yes," said Jane. She nodded her head once, decisively, determined to not let herself take anymore flights of fancy. "Good."

v. 

"They're gone," reported Miss Gwen, once the door to Jane's bedchamber was safely closed. "Both of them. I didn't think Whittlesby had it in him."

"Didn't you?" asked Jane. She crossed the room to sit on the settee beneath the window. "I did."

"Oh?" said Miss Gwen, her eyebrows raised in obvious suspicion. "Was that why you were so keen on discouraging Emma where the poet was concerned? Don't think I didn't notice what you were up to."

Jane didn't answer, but glanced out the window instead. She estimated that Augustus and Emma had nearly a half hour's start on Bonaparte's troops. It would be enough, if they were careful. If Augustus was as good at the fleeing part of spy work as he was at maintaining a secret identity. She hoped that he was. For both their sakes.

"Or is it something else?" Miss Gwen asked, her voice nearer than it had been before. 

Jane looked up to see her looming overhead, her face set with a determination that Jane normally associated with the firing of munitions. 

"What else is there?" Jane asked, with as much attempted levity as she dared. It was possible that her chaperone knew her too well now, that she'd seen beyond the facade that Jane kept up even to herself. She couldn't bear to have it torn down now, not when they were well past the point where anything good could rise from the destruction. "Surely you're not suggesting that I had any other motive than concern for Emma's safety?"

" _Ha_!" snorted Miss Gwen. "You can fool Emperor's and courtiers and the _ton_ , but you can't fool me, young lady. You're _jealous_."

"No," denied Jane, shaking her head. "I assure you I'm not."

That it wasn't jealousy was true enough, though there might have been the smallest of kernels of truth in Miss Gwen's words. She wasn't jealous of Emma and Augustus's relationship--their _love_ , if that's truly what it was--but more the _idea_ of it. She'd watched her cousin and her friends and fellow agents fall in love, one by one, each of them leaving her more alone in turn. 

She didn't love Augustus. But maybe, just maybe, she'd loved the idea of him.

"You could have had him," Miss Gwen said, and it was as if she were echoing Jane's own thoughts. "If you'd given him the slightest bit of encouragement, he would have been yours for the taking."

"I didn't want him," said Jane. "Not like that. Truly, I didn't."

"Then why are you so down in the mouth?" demanded Miss Gwen. "They're safely away; we've foiled the plans of invasion _again_. What more could you possibly hope for?"

Jane forced herself to smile and hoped that it didn't look as sad as she inexplicably felt. "Perhaps, a friend."


End file.
